By Nora Soriño
Iligan City Bureau Chief

Iligan City — A holy mass was said at the site of the Bayug island morning yesterday, to mark the eighth anniversary of the deadly storm Sendong (international name: Washi).

‘GROUND ZERO.’ Typhoon Sendong survivor Victoriano Pabayo, 34, in an undated photo visits “Ground Zero,” his former home in Sitio Cala-cala, Barangay Macasandig, where he lost his three children to raging floodwaters years ago. Two of his children were confirmed dead while another has been declared missing. Pabayo now lives in a relocation site in Camaman-an. The city remembers the Dec. 16-17, 2011 Sendong devastation. (GSD File PHOTO BY NITZ ARANCON)

The island, to note, caught the brunt of the tragedy that was Sendong that struck on the said day in 2011.

Acting city mayorJemar Vera Cruz in his speech attended mostly by city hall employees and people living near the area said that “we must learn from the lessons of the past.”

To recall, the waters began to swell the evening of Dec. 16, 2011. But it was in the very early morning of Dec. 17 when the waters struck its strongest, sending hundreds to their watery graves.

Bayug island then tumbled with the waters and those who were living there mostly could not escape the force of the deadly surging waters. After that, people were discouraged to build structures there on what had been left of the island. But still, there are a few who have set up some structures there.

Hundreds died even as hundreds were missing. Among the media men who died were Eni Alsonado and Michael Kundiman.